Sunday, January 26, 2014

In SW Portland's Pendleton Park, a giant 8' rabbit statue watches over the playground. This is Vincent, Waiting for Alice. It's yet another Keith Jellum sculpture; at this point I've lost track of how many of those I've covered here. I'm honestly not seeking them out particularly, but I keep running into them everywhere, all the time. In any case, he has a blurb about Vincent, Waiting for Alice on its RACC page:

In Louis Carroll's “Alice in Wonderland,” Alice is lured into her journey by the site of a white rabbit that keeps dashing out of sight, just beyond her reach. At one point in the tale, Alice finally encounters the white rabbit that is late for a party given by the duchess. However, the rabbit has misplaced its gloves and fan and sends Alice to retrieve them. As an adult, I still delight in the playfulness of this story and see it as a metaphor for pursuing one's dreams - even when the dream seems beyond one's reach. May your imaginations run wild in the pursuit of dreams!

Designing a giant Lewis Carroll rabbit is probably harder than it sounds; you have to avoid anything that remotely resembles a Disney character, because lawyers, and you also have to avoid making a terrifying Donnie Darko rabbit. Ok, a scary Donnie Darko rabbit statue actually sounds kind of awesome, but there would be Concerned Neighborhood Parents if you tried that, especially in this part of town.

I don't really have any more material about this particular rabbit, but YouTube is full of random video clips about giant rabbits, Carroll-esque or otherwise, so here's a brief selection.

Dr. McCoy's run-in with a giant Alice in Wonderland rabbit (which is actually a robot), from the original Star Trek episode Shore Leave